


Best Friend Duty Doesn't Come With Hazard Pay (But It Should)

by ashurbadaktu



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Gen, Past Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-04
Updated: 2012-10-04
Packaged: 2017-11-15 14:31:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/528317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ashurbadaktu/pseuds/ashurbadaktu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles notices something he doesn't like about Derek and how he treats Scott and because he's Stiles, tries to do something about it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Best Friend Duty Doesn't Come With Hazard Pay (But It Should)

**Author's Note:**

> I like Scott.
> 
> This is not Sterek-y.
> 
> Not beta read because I lack a beta.

He’d always thought of it as a joke, something people said in the movies. ‘I don’t like the way you’re looking at ________’ where the blank was ‘my dame’ or ‘my car’ or ‘me’. (Because Stiles had watched way too many old black and white movies when he couldn’t sleep at night). But as he watched the subtle twitches in Scott’s posture, followed the lines of his eyes drop to the ground in between every frustrated answer, saw the shift in his shoulders, he decided that he really didn’t like how Derek looked at Scott.

He’d had to see it before, years before, when Scott was even shorter than he was now. The Scott with a cast on his wrist. The Scott with a bandage over his cheek. The Scott whose jaw was perfectly symmetrical, like most faces were, because it hadn’t healed in the wrong position yet. Someone else had looked at Scott like that, like he was in the WAY, like it was HIS fault that he'd been brought into this shitty situation, like he wasn't good enough and never would be. Stiles had dealt with it as well as he could back then, mostly by acting as irritating as possible for the little thrill it gave him to watch Mr. McCall want desperately to smack him when he knew that the asshole was painfully aware that he couldn't so much as puff air at the sheriff's son.

Then he'd cut that shit out and felt horrible when he figured out that it just meant that Scott would get it later, after he'd gone home. He'd bugged his mom into a trip to the fair for he and Scott to try and make up for it, but even at that age he'd known it was the least he could do.

Stiles was smart enough to realize, logically, that Derek 1. had no idea what he was doing (and wow did that go for a lot of Senor Sourwolf's behavior, not just this) and that 2. Scott had no way of doing anything about it without talking about shit that not only was absolutely none of Derek's business, but also wouldn't really help with that whole 'controlling rage' issue. Scott's dad was kind of rage central for anyone who'd had the displeasure of knowing him.

Plus, the Leather Loser would probably take it as 'whining' and then Stiles would dent his bumper hitting him with his jeep. Repeatedly.

Problem was, other than this 'Alpha' (who was a crazy murdering beast thing), they were fresh out of teachers for the Scott McCall School for Werewolves Who Don't Werewolf Good Yet. Which meant that Scott was going to try to listen to this douchecanoe. Which Stiles hated because he wasn't about to leave him there to deal with it alone and that meant that he had to watch his best friend twitch like a fiend.

\--

Stiles didn't like how Derek talked to people. He didn't like that he thought he could be angry and pissy and growl at people and they'd just do what he wanted. That kind of attitude had always rubbed him the wrong way, because it worked for other people way too often and usually he just got ignored. It made him wonder if, before the Hale fire, Derek'd been a spoiled little jerk like Jackson, a werewolf princess with a tiny pink tiara made of squirrel bones or something.

That mental image was very useful in keeping him from saying something that might get him ripped open. Usually.

It didn't help that again, forever, always, worst way to deal with Scott ever. Scott panicked when people were pissed at him, and if you were pissed at him all the time, he was PANICKED all the time and again, it came down to wondering why Derek couldn't pick up the veritable waves of NO WRONG DO NOT WANT with his werewolf radar or whatever. Stiles knew he was extremely intelligent (if somewhat scattered and a little without focus and he had a tendency to go off on tangents and sometimes his references didn't entirely make sense but he was always happy to explain if people would listen and wasn't that really the most important part?) and that he'd known Scott practically since they were both in diapers (Stiles had finished potty training first, thank you very much), but if Derek could smell lies and sense Alphas and whatever the fuck else he had, you'd think someone would have taught him how to tell when he was going about things the wrong way.

But no. No, apparently he just thought that was how Scott was (which, no, he wasn't, Scott was one of the most chill dudes in ever most of the time which was why they worked so well as a team) and he was gonna continue with his threats and his emotional blackmail until he drowned in the bag of dicks produced by the mutant powers Stiles was planning on developing for just that purpose.

It wasn't much of a plan, but he didn't really know what else to do and it wasn't that much more outlandish than his life actually was at the moment.

\--

Stiles was pissed at Scott. He had EVERY RIGHT to be pissed at Scott. Scott had gone off and left him alone when things were completely insane and he'd turned off his phone to spend the day with Allison when he NEEDED him, NEEDED, thank you very much. And then he'd come back and all that werewolf daring had taken a hike when his dad, his DAD, was in danger. It was a dick move and Scott was his BEST FRIEND and oh dear God he knew exactly why this had happened but he was still pissed and he had every right to be pissed.

Scott was stupid when he felt cornered and he'd been cornered and so he'd been stupid. Stiles didn't think that excused him, not even a little, but he did annoyingly understand what had happened and that meant that he was mad, he was DEFINITELY mad, but he was already starting to forgive him because Scott KNEW he'd been stupid.

Stiles would point out that what his friend lacked in height he more than made up for in puppy eyes. It was ANNOYING. And he was having trouble keeping himself from turning around and helping because of it, squirming in his seat, when he heard that Scott was going to work with Derek and that was when he couldn't stand it anymore.

...of course, he coudn't help it if his ideas were a little mean. Dick moves required dick moves in return. And his were at least useful.

\--

"No," he snapped as his passenger side door closed and Derek Hale, frown prince of fail, tried to growl an order.

"Whatever it is, Stiles, I do not have time for it-"

"IT IS NOT NONSENSE AND YOU ARE GOING TO LISTEN TO ME OR I SWEAR TO GOD, I WILL TAZE YOU."

Derek's nose flared and he looked like he was going to dare him to try or threaten to rip his throat out if he tried until he looked down and noticed that Stiles already had the 'gun against Derek's side. He'd stashed it in the center storage box for JUST this occasion. Get jumped in your jeep enough by werewolves and you start planning.

"I'll get back up. And then I'll rip your head off."

"Yeah, tell it to someone who cares," he said with an ease he didn't actually feel but let it never be said that Stiles Stilinski could not bluff. He'd once rolled a 50 on a Bluff check (bard buffs could be DIRTY), though only Scott would ever know about that.

Derek growled a little but seemed as content as he got to listen... for at least a minute.

"You're going about dealing with Scott all wrong."

There came the growl again. "I'm trying to teach him to be strong. To stay ALIVE. I'm--"

"Freaking him the fuck out and reminding him of an asshole he really doesn't need a reminder of. Or does your training regimen usually involve traumatizing young werewolves until they hate you? Because unless that's your plan, you're going to fail. You are on the fail boat. The fail cruise has left and you are the captain of--"

"STILES!"

He startled a little at the loud noise and almost tazed him by accident but thankfully he hadn't taken the safety off. Double thankfully, Derek didn't seem to have noticed that.

He took a deep breath and rapped on the steering wheel a few times to gather his thoughts again.

"Look, I'm not going into details because you haven't earned details. But believe me that I'm trying to help you when I tell you to cool off with the 'weakness' bullshit and the threatening and the jumping him. Also, I don't know if you're aware but, despite the big house? Scott's family doesn't have a whole lot of money so trashing his cellphone is kind of a big fucking deal. You're just lucky I had my old one still working and know how to jailbreak."

Derek was breathing hard, obviously a little side-swiped by all of this, but his pride reared its head up again.

"Then what do you suggest?" came out, grudgingly.

"Try... talking to him like a person? Like someone who, you know, you want to work with? Yeah, he's a little one track and a little squishy, but Scott's not stupid. Stop trying to just scare him in line and treat him like, you know, that whole 'brother' thing you pulled on him."

"I'm trying to keep him safe."

"Well, you're doing a shitty job of it," Stiles snapped back, "because maybe the frickin' Hunters won't get him like this, but you're doing damage all by yourself."

Derek rolled his eyes.

"As if anything gets through his little cloud of puppy love--"

He jabbed him in the side with the tazer but didn't push the button.

"He doesn't want you to notice! He's good at covering it up! He had to be. But that doesn't mean he'll trust you and it doesn't mean he'll want to have anything to do with you if you keep up with this shit."

Derek grunted at the jab and almost looked like he was going to attack before he breathed in a few times. Then he glared at Stiles.

"You can't understand what's going on here. You're not a werewolf--"

"No," and he glared right back, "but I'm Scott's friend. And I'm telling you. Cut that shit out or you'll regret it."

"Is that a threat?"

Stiles actually had to laugh at that, and he finally pulled the tazer away because this guy, this guy was just... he was just RIDICULOUSLY thick and maybe there was nothing he could do here but at least he'd tried.

"Dude, you are the last person to complain about people threatening you. It's just the truth. You might be an expert on werewolfing, but I am an expert on Scott McCall. Just... think about it."

Derek was quiet for a second, and Stiles actually thought that maybe something had sunk in. The moment passed quickly enough, though, and suddenly Derek was in his face and he was halfway across his car.

"Don't threaten me again."

Stiles could hear his own heartbeat in his ears because there were fangs and slightly glowing blue eyes and his fight or flight instinct was screaming but of course, what came out was what came out.

"No promises."

A lunge, a scare, and then he was back in the driver's seat and Derek was very much gone, the only sign of his presence an open passenger door. Stiles leaned back, breathed in and out a few times, then leaned over to pull the door closed.

Well.

Well.

"You owe me, buddy."

He was glad Scott wasn't there, though. Because he didn't really mean it. He'd done it for himself. 

He might have had to watch someone fuck with Scott back when they were little, but he'd be damned if he sat back and just let it happen now. Thundering heart aside? He actually felt pretty good about himself.


End file.
